When amateur astronomer Ron Arbour spotted an enormous explosion from 17 million light-years away in the Fireworks Galaxy (NGC 6946), many professional scientists believed that it was the final death throes of a massive dying star. However, observations from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope unexpectedly showed that a relatively lightweight star was the source of this spectacular blast. The explosion, called SN 2008S, was first spotted in February 2008.